Now that was a political maneuver. The article about the guy in Canada didn't say what the reason was for searching him.

>"Officers are trained in examination, investigative and questioning techniques. To divulge our approach may render our techniques ineffective. Officers are trained to look for indicators of deception and use a risk management approach in determining which goods may warrant a closer look"

This statement makes it look like they noticed something about him that prompted the search.

That description seems awfully close to saying an officer can selectively interfere with someone's life just because the officer didn't like the look of him.

I think we all know how that one turns out.

Sure, it gets us the "Terry stop", a police tactic which the Supreme Court currently says is legal.

In Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968), Terry was represented by Louis Stokes, who went on to become a luminary in local and national politics. Here's what Stokes said about the case, from http://nymag.com/news/intelligencer/nypd-stop-and-frisk-2012... :

> Stokes, chairman of the legal-­redress committee of the Cleveland NAACP, believed the arrest was dubious.

> Representing Terry in court, Stokes pressed [arresting officer Martin] McFadden on the stand, where he got him to admit that the men weren’t doing anything other than peering into store windows, and that he’d never busted anyone before for seeming to case a business. “What attracted you to them?” Stokes asked.

> “Well, to tell the truth,” McFadden answered, “I didn’t like them.”

Relevant: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/05/nypd-memo-stop-and-...

It just a way for them to justify searching anyone. He looked suspicious so the officer searched him. I'm certain they could say it about anyone.

Right... Maybe the guy has dark skin?

I wasn't clear.

David Miranda was carrying material which he must have known a government would show interest in.

They (unacceptable) stop and search found the data, and it was mostly unencrypted.